


breaking point (breaking free remix)

by Welcoming_Disaster



Category: Marvel Ultimates
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Character Study, Coming Out, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pre-Slash, Steve Rogers Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 00:53:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29601330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Welcoming_Disaster/pseuds/Welcoming_Disaster
Summary: Steve would like to be on the straight and narrow.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 7
Kudos: 33
Collections: 2021 Captain America/Iron Man Remix Madness





	breaking point (breaking free remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Breaking Free [!Art]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29129088) by [DarthBloodOrange (DepressingGreenie)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DepressingGreenie/pseuds/DarthBloodOrange). 
  * In response to a prompt by [DepressingGreenie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DepressingGreenie/pseuds/DepressingGreenie) in the [2021_Cap_Ironman_Remix_Madness](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/2021_Cap_Ironman_Remix_Madness) collection. 



> Written for the Captain America Iron Man Remix Madness!

“I’m tired of living a lie,” Steve says, into the mirror, the way he practices every speech he has time to, “I’m tired of people like you having blackmail material on me. Everyone has a breaking point, and— well, people don’t even care anymore. Sir Ian McLennan—” 

He glances down at his notecard, corrects himself. 

“Sir Ian McKellen was on TV, talking about it.”

He wonders what it says about him that, even now, he can’t quite call it by its name. 

He’s never called it by its name. No one has ever called it by its name, to him. It’s always been words with a sort of uneasy, low thrumming tension, the negative space around them forming the actual picture. 

(“A bit of a bachelor, isn’t he?” 

“Nothing of the sort, pal. Fiancee back home. He’s very true to her, that’s all.”)

Or otherwise it’s eye contact, the sort of look where both parties are willing each other, desperately, to read the same story they are, to stay on the same page, the kind of look that, otherwise, Steve has only ever experienced in combat. It’s a different kind of tension, hanging in the air, a fear tinged with something else entirely. 

(“We could leave.” 

“Let’s leave.” 

“I’d like to be alone right now.” 

“I wouldn’t mind being alone, either.” 

“So, that’s settled, then. Two of us. Alone.” 

“Sure thing, yeah. We ought to find a place to be alone, don’t you think?”)

You can never be sure. It’s hearing the countdown of a bomb and not knowing if it’ll explode in your face or take out your enemies. 

It hangs in the air, thick and ever-present, and sometimes Steve is convinced everyone else can see it and just doesn’t have the words to bring it up. He dreams, sometimes, of himself covered in handprints, of people pointing and laughing. There goes Captain America. He’s a— 

He wakes up, always, before he learns what he is. It’s easier that way. 

It’s not that there aren’t words, even. 

He’s certainly heard all of them, back in his day — though, to be fair, there had been fewer then — but that none of them have ever fit him. 

When he was twelve years old, he’d checked a copy of _The Picture of Dorian Grey_ out of the library. That was the first time he’d run into it, the avoidance, the way his mother had picked the book up and frowned, told him he’d better return it. Steve, who’d already blown through the book and found nothing in it but the slightly discomforting story of an evil painting, in which he’d liked absolutely nobody, still remembered the strange confusion, the unease. 

Years later, he still doesn’t care for Oscar Wilde. 

Even Fury, normally so direct, so crude, had danced around it. 

“Cap,” he had said, several weeks after Steve had woken up in the future, “we’ve learned about your liaisons.” 

Steve’s heart had damn near stopped. He hadn’t said anything, watching Fury with the wary eyes of a cornered predator. Let him make the first move. Let him say what he knows and what he’s ready to do with the information.

It had never happened before, but Steve had known the drill. He still doesn’t know exactly where he’d gotten it from, this understanding that connects him to all the other men that live and die in this strange, in-between place, the space that can't be named. 

“We aren’t going to say anything,” Fury had said, “I’m just letting you know.” 

And Steve had said, “OK.” and that had been it. 

The thing is, though, that Steve isn’t the kind of man who likes secrets. He likes everything on the straight and narrow, likes to understand and be understood. He likes to label things. He likes to be in control. 

If SHIELD has this written down, anyone else could get their hands on it. If SHIELD has this written down, it will take one breach for the whole world to know, and then it’ll be their words, and not his. 

The issue is that he hates every single word. _Gay_ makes him think of men who wear makeup and dresses and dance to the sorts of show tunes even the gals scoff at. _Homosexual_ is a diagnosis. _LGBT_ makes him feel like a vitamin supplement. 

But he’ll take any of them over the sorts of words other people throw at him. 

The first time he ever mentions it directly, it goes something like this: 

He stands, while Fury is sitting.

This should give him a feeling of power, but instead it only makes him feel like he’s overreacting. Anxiety, harsh and roiling, boils under his skin. 

“I’m tired of living a lie,” he says, “and frankly, I’m bad at it, and I’m going to tell everyone.” 

“No,” Fury says, undercutting him, “you’re not.” 

Steve doesn’t know how to talk about this. Steve doesn’t know what to say. 

“Sir Ian—“ he fumbles for the card where he’d written down the name, realizes he’s left it. “There was an actor talking about it on TV. People talk about it now.”

“Not Captain America.” 

“You don’t have anything over me,” Steve says. “I want this out. Your blackmail—“ 

“If this gets out,” Fury says, calmly, “you’re going to be discharged from the army. We are going to fire you. Your apartment is paid for by SHIELD. Your equipment is paid for by SHIELD. Your team is paid for by SHIELD. Do you have friends, Rogers? Is there anyone on whose couch you’re going to be able to crash after that particular revelation?” 

_Bucky and Gail,_ Steve wants to say, but the words freeze in his throat. Gail had loved him, once upon a time. She won’t understand this. Everyone has a breaking point. He can’t ask her to understand this. 

Mutely, he shakes his head. 

“So,” Fury says, “are we done here, son?” 

“Yes,” Steve says, quietly, “yessir.” 

When he leaves the room, he feels like a foolish little boy, caught reading a library book he can't understand, trying to make himself into something he can never be. 

Tony Stark is standing just outside of Fury’s office, sipping coffee. Caught in his own thoughts, Steve almost doesn’t notice him. 

“Wait,” Stark says, and Steve turns to look at him. 

“What?” 

“You dropped this.” Stark’s holding out a notecard. 

Steve takes it. The card doesn’t say much — he’s only scrawled “Sir Ian McKellen” over the top. It shouldn’t mean anything to anyone but him. 

“Thanks,” he says, taking the card. 

Their fingers brush. Stark has just come in from the cold; he’s wearing gloves. When their eyes meet, the look is too significant to be natural.

Stark knows. He can see the handprints, the things unspoken hanging over Steve. He’s thinking a word about him, and Steve doesn’t know which one. 

He feels like he’s hearing the ticking of a bomb, and he doesn’t know which side had dropped it. 

**Author's Note:**

> Soo, I tried to shift the focus onto Steve's POV over Tony overhearing something. I hope you liked it!! <3


End file.
